


Memento Mori

by Telaryn



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Family, Gen, McCall Family Feels, Serious, Sick Stiles, Spoilers, Stilinski Family Feels, Teen Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-13
Updated: 2014-02-13
Packaged: 2018-01-12 05:45:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1182603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Telaryn/pseuds/Telaryn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What passed between Melissa and the Sheriff while the boys were having their talk.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memento Mori

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for Season 3 - "Riddled". This is THAT scene, from Mama McCall's point of view.
> 
> So...for all of my friends who wanted to see what I'd do with Teen Wolf fic (that wasn't Peter Hale porn...)?
> 
> Here you go...

He was her son too, as much as Scott had belonged to Claudia in the beginning. None of them had ever bothered saying the words out loud; they’d simply followed the lead of their children. Scott and Stiles had claimed each other as toddlers as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

Even now, with his entire future resting on the outcome of what was about to happen, the first words Stiles had spoken since they brought him in were, “Can I talk to Scott alone for a sec?”

He was one of the steadiest men she’d ever known – you would have to be to parent a boy like Stiles – but Melissa saw how the Sheriff nodded a hair too quickly in agreement with his son’s request. The boys only had eyes for each other in this moment, but as he rushed from the room she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Stiles’ father wasn’t in this moment. _Not anymore._

Trusting Scott to his responsibilities, she followed the Sheriff into the observation room. Melissa remembered all too clearly how they’d nearly lost him too when his wife had died. If it hadn’t been for his son – pale, fragile, too smart for his own good and desperately needing his father’s strength and guidance – she knew things might have turned out very differently for all of them.

“He’s going to be all right.” It was the wrong thing to say – the worst thing she could say – but it was all she had to offer him.

And he responded exactly as she supposed she would have in his position. “You don’t know that,” he snapped, rounding on her so savagely she drew back a step. “You _can’t_ know that.” He wasn’t angry with her; intellectually she understood that, but her heart was still racing with the sudden surge of adrenaline his outburst had caused when she forced herself to square off with him.

“I _believe_ it,” she said fiercely, pressing a clenched fist to her heart. “And I’m going to go on believing it until I have to stop. You don’t think it’s going to kill me too if the worst happens to him?” She flung her hand towards the observation window. “You really think Scott is going to be able to keep it together if this goes south?” _He’s my son too…_ a tiny corner of her soul wailed in anguish, but even though Stiles had given her his semi-conscious blessing of the relationship days earlier, the man standing opposite her hadn’t.

And there were protocols to be observed in situations like this, things adults never said out loud to each other, no matter how deeply they felt them.

“We’re going to know what this is soon enough,” she forced herself to continue – even though the words were catching in her throat now, “and until that happens the only things we have on our side are faith and hope. Stiles needs that from all of us.” Reaching out, she put a faintly trembling hand on his muscled forearm. “He _deserves_ that.”

The small amount of physical contact proved to be the Sheriff’s undoing. Melissa heard a small sob escape him as his arms went around her – pulling her into a hug so tight it bordered on the painful. “I can’t lose him, Melissa,” he whispered. “Not like this. Not…”

“Shh…” she soothed, reaching up to rest her hand against his cheek. “Faith and hope, remember? No worrying about the worst that can happen until we have to.”

For all her brave words, Melissa knew that if fate ended up taking Stiles down the same road his mother had traveled, there was almost no chance the man standing opposite her would live out the year. It would be quick and messy – likely the last action his service revolver would see – but it would happen. She couldn’t reasonably say she would do any different in his shoes.

“Faith and hope,” she repeated quietly – not pulling free of his embrace as they turned to watch their sons through the observation window. Whatever Stiles was saying, Scott was clearly struggling with it – but Melissa knew that if he could hold it together it would be one of the best shields Stiles could carry with him into this coming battle. The boys hugged at last – Scott obviously having come to some sort of conclusion – and she felt her heart try and climb its way up into her throat. 

The Sheriff’s arms tightened around her briefly, and Melissa knew if she had the courage to look his expression would likely be a mirror of her own. “I’m glad whatever happens he won’t have to go through this alone.” The words were soft and bruised sounding – the tone of voice she knew he used when he was barely hanging on, when he had to let some of his fears out or be consumed by them.

Even though she knew Scott couldn’t see her through the observation window, Melissa imagined for a moment that he could, that he shared her resolve to do whatever it took to keep the worst at bay. “He has a family that loves him. You both do.” She leaned into him, willing as much of her strength to pass to him as she could. “Whatever you need, we’ll make it happen,” she finished, ridiculously grateful for the difference in their heights that meant he couldn’t see that she was the one crying in earnest now.

“Faith and hope?” he asked, hugging her to his side again.

It made her smile through the tears. “Faith and hope.”


End file.
